There was a foul smell in the air, a thick musk that made me want to wretch. Demons often had their own individual scents, but the fact demons didn’t understand the concept of hygiene invariably meant those scents were horrible. And with as many demons around as there were, the stench hit me almost like a physical blow.

The demon queen and nearly a dozen demons had broken out of the containment facility through a hole that they’d somehow made in the wall. Instead of scattering, they remained together and started heading towards the flight line and the helicopters that were landed there. Perhaps the demon queen was drawn to the people gathered there, but since she was more intelligent than any other demon I’d ever encountered, her goal might very well be to cut off anyone from escaping.

Fortunately, the demons had been slowed by the soldiers who’d returned with Colonel Roberts. To my surprise, they had a group of third DSU soldiers fighting alongside them. I had to admit that whatever problems we had with the third, they were definitely willing to do their jobs. And since they were used to fighting demons without angels running point, they had to be good just to survive.

One demon shot out from the group, moving at ridiculous speeds as it raced towards the third DSU soldiers. It easily dodged their shorts, tearing into one and then leaping at another. Five soldiers went down in as many seconds and the rest would have continued to fall if Dani hadn’t gotten the lead on its movements and shot it. Once the demon fell to the ground with a large hole in its side, the remaining third soldiers quickly finished it off.

“We have to draw their attention towards us,” Rebecca exclaimed. “We can avoid them more easily than anyone else.”

“That sounds kind of dangerous,” Julie said in a clear understatement.

“Welcome to being an angel,” Nicole responded, pausing to fire several more shots. “We usually have big targets painted on our chests since we can survive the demons easier than any of the soldiers.”

“I forgot just how much I loved this,” Lisa muttered sarcastically.

“And I forgot all about your cheerful optimistic attitude,” Nicole teased her.

“Colonel,” Rebecca called out over the radio. “We’re glad you’re safe, but maybe you and the non-combatants should start evacuating out of here…”

“We’re trying to get the non-combatants loaded up,” Colonel Roberts responded over the radio. “Unfortunately, most of the ones who really need to be evacuated are hunkered down, waiting for the threat to be dealt with.”

I scowled, remembering that the Pit was an operating base and that the third DSU weren’t normally stationed here. That meant all the normal support crew and guards for this base were still around, even though I hadn’t seen them yet. If we didn’t stop the demons, the demons would just spread out, find those people and either kill or infect them.

“I guess that means the tactical nuke is out,” Dani joked, though we were all aware that if we didn’t get this threat contained, someone might very well drop a nuke on us to keep this mass of demons from spreading, regardless of whether or not there were still people here.

“This was not in my escape plan,” Lisa exclaimed in frustration, firing several shots at the mass of demons. “We were supposed to come get you guys, the soldiers were supposed to retrieve Carl and the others, then we were supposed to get back to the helicopters and fly out of here. We weren’t supposed to be going into a demon zone.”

“Lisa always liked making plans,” Nicole told me with a giggle. “But she always gets so flustered when they don’t work out like she expected.”

I stared at the mass of demons, and at the demon queen who was in the middle of the group, being shielded by those who surrounded her. Then she let out several more of her shrieks and the demon mass suddenly broke up and scattered, with groups of demons heading towards the different groups of people who were fighting them.

One large and muscular demon leapt through the air, landing in the middle of a group of first DSU soldiers and swung his fists. Mike jumped back and opened fire but another soldier wasn’t fast enough and was hit with a solid blow that sent him flying back. Another demon charged straight in, slashing his claws right across Gene’s chest.

“GENE,” I called out, opening fire on the clawed demon who shot out to the side, slicing at one of the third DSU stragglers who’d come with us from inside the compound. The soldier went down while the demon continued to the next target…me.

I jumped back as the demon slashed through the air where I’d been a moment ago, then I opened fire at point blank range, putting multiple holes through his chest. The demon was bleeding black goo all over but was still continuing to try staggering forward, driven by pure rabid malevolence. I gave him one more shot between his eyes and he collapsed to the ground.

“Gene,” I called out, rushing to his side as he was getting up from the ground on his own.

“It…it didn’t get me,” Gene blurted out, running his hands over the gouges in his armor. “Thank God this new armor stopped it…”

I grinned in relief at that, then pointed out, “You might want to thank Lisa rather than God this time.”

After a moment, I joined with the others in shooting the muscular demon, who seemed to be nearly bulletproof. This one wasn’t opening his mouth to roar and scream so I couldn’t get a shot in there. Whether this was because he somehow realized it was a vulnerable spot or if he’d adapted to no longer use his vocal chords or something, I had no idea. But considering the intelligence of the average demon, I was betting it was more the latter than the former.

In spite of his toughness, it didn’t take much longer for that demon to go down. Having half a dozen people shooting at it simultaneously had been enough to get through his tough hide and finish him off.

As I looked around, I saw another group of third DSU soldiers, but they were heading to the helicopters rather than the fight. It took me several seconds to realize why, they were escorting Lawrence and Dolenz. I suddenly had a very bad feeling about that.

The demon queen had been standing back and letting the other demons do most of the fighting, but then she seemed to notice the movement towards the helicopters and let out a loud hiss. As she began moving towards the helicopters, I grabbed Dani’s arm and pointed.

“Oh shit,” Dani muttered, right before the two of us began running right for the demon queen. It took a moment to realize that Julie was following as well.

We opened fire on the demon queen, who stopped in order to face us. She let out a hiss and rose up, raising her coils to act as armor.

“Egg killersss,” the demon snarled angrily. “You killed my childrensss. Now I will kill you…”

The demon queen lunged as us but we dove to the side and avoided her attack. She followed that up with a swing of her tail that caught Julie by surprise. Julie let out a gasp as she was sent flying. I was worried about her, until I saw her slowly getting back to her feet.

“We need help with this bitch,” Dani called back to our other sisters.

Moments later, Rebecca, Nicole, and Lisa came running towards us, though Lisa paused to shoot at one of the other demons who was going after Mike. Then once that demon was down as well, she joined us in attacking the demon queen.

“Hard to believe this is Doctor Yavich,” Lisa commented with a look of disgust.

“Yavich,” the demon queen hissed in contempt while looking to Lisa. “Yavich wasss human. Yavich wasss sssmall and weak…”

“Yavich had an inflated ego and a hunger for recognition,” Lisa responded, firing several shots at the demon queen. “I can still see the resemblance.”

The demon queen snarled and lunged at Lisa, though she dove to the side and avoided the demon’s claws. However, her tail swung out and smashed into Dani who was sent flying back.

“Ssso many Rebeccasss,” the demon queen snarled before lunging at Nicole and clawing her across the front, knocking the gun from her hand. Then she slashed at Julie, who screamed and fell backwards as she scrambled to avoid being hit.

“You can’t get infected anymore,” Rebecca reminded our newest sister, who looked quite embarrassed.

“I don’t know how much in the way of brains you have left in that ugly head of yours,” Lisa called out to the demon queen. “But I’m Lisa… You remember…you once called me a flat-chested dyke…” Then she snarled and started shooting at the demon queen with a look of satisfaction. “I’ve been wanting to do that to you for YEARS.”

The demon queen snarled and let out a loud shriek. Suddenly, the remaining demons ceased attacking the individual soldiers and rushed back to her side. There only four of the demons left and two of them were in rough shape, but they made it much more difficult to fight the queen.

One of the demons was hunched over and running on four legs, built somewhat like a dog but with bony plates and spikes over its body. That one charged straight at me, and though I hit it in the head with my gun, it kept coming. I barely jumped out of the way fast enough to avoid being hit by the demon, though it continued running and slammed right into Nicole, who’d been distracted by the demon queen.

Nicole gasped loudly and dropped to the ground with a large spike sticking out of her stomach. The demon looked as though it was about to bite her neck when I shot it again, taking several more shots to make sure I had its attention. After letting out a roar, the creature came at me again.

From the corner of my eye, I saw the demon queen swinging her tail right at me again. I smiled faintly and jumped out of the way, just in time to let the other demon take the impact for me. There was a sickening crunch sound as the boney demon was sent flying. And as soon as it hit the ground again, Rebecca, Dani, and myself opened fire on it, hitting it with enough firepower to tear through the now badly cracked bony armor and kill it.

“Nicole,” I exclaimed, running to my sister’s side and looked at the wound where she had a spike sticking out of her.

“This hurts,” Nicole gasped, pulling the bony spike out before I could warn her not to do so.

“Damn it,” I exclaimed, grabbing her and trying to put pressure on her wound to keep her from bleeding out.

Nicole gave me a weak chuckle and said, “Deja-vu…”

“Yeah,” I agreed with a forced smile. “Haven’t we already done this?”

I silently cursed the fact that I hadn’t brought my bag of medical supplies with me and that the nearest equipment was in the helicopter. But while I was considering the option of running to the helicopter, Rebecca yelled, “Watch out.”

I looked up and saw what Rebecca was warning about. Some of the soldiers from the third were positioning themselves to attack the demon queen and the three remaining demons. My eyes went wide as I realized that one of the soldiers was carrying some kind of gatling gun while another had a grenade launcher. They opened fire on the demons without any concern that the angels were in the way.

“Damn,” I exclaimed, grabbing Nicole and carrying out of the firing zone.

The demons were being torn apart by the gatling gun but there was no accuracy as the bullets were covering the entire area. Lisa screamed as two of the bullets hit her, but Julie grabbed hold of her and half carried her out of the firing zone.

One of the demons made a run for it, moving at incredible speeds. However, Rebecca and Dani were able to get a lock on her and take her out before she could actually escape.

“Holy shit,” I muttered, looking over the demon queen and her followers. Between the gatling gun and the grenade launcher, they’d been torn to pieces.

“That is how you kill demons,” the third DSU soldier with the gatling gun called out smugly.

“Yeah, but try using that stuff where we normally hunt and there would be ridiculous collateral damage,” Nicole said with a grimace.

The demon queen wasn’t moving but Rebecca hurried towards her body anyway. “The job isn’t done yet.” When she reached the demon queen, she put the barrel of her gun right up to the demon’s head and pulled the trigger. The head exploded in a mass of ooze. “Now it’s done.”

“We should have done that the last time,” Dani said, while the rest of us nodded agreement.

I stared at the dead demon queen and let out a sigh of relief, thankful that she was done for good this time. Then I turned my attention to the helicopter pad, where Senator Dolenz and General Lawrence were waiting with a squad of armed soldiers. I suddenly realized that we may have taken out the demon queen, but that didn’t mean we were out of danger yet. In fact, our biggest threats were still very much alive.